I can see how The Big Hand can signify heroin, such as in Black Sabbath's Hand of Doom or Sabbath Bloody Sabbath "you're wishing that the hand of doom can take your mind away". However, in the VHS Play Out version of the song he says something like "and the big hand sees the things that you've done". So I am leaning towards the whole hand of God concept rather than drugs.
I am very intrigued about what a previous commentor said about the Hand motifs in Wish's album art and how The Big Hand was kept off the album. I think this is very telling and I will add more on the subject, even my own far-fetched conspiracy theory! So the Wikipedia article for A Letter to Elise makes reference to a radio interview with Boris Williams and how he used his influence to keep The Big Hand from being released a single A-side. I think he also may have used his influence to make Wish the commercial album it ultimately became in 1992.
Backtrack to 1991. The Cure released 2 VHS cassettes that year. Picture Show featured an instrumental version of The Big Hand during the rolling of the credits and Play Out showed The Big Hand as the first song performed on the Video. Coupled with the fact that they had plans for the song to be a single A-Side and the hand drawings on the album cover, this has got to be the most important B-Side they ever had. In fact it seems intentionally buried, shunted off to an obscure European single, far from American audiences while Friday I'm in Love nanced it's way across MTV and every radio station ad nauseum.
I will make no secret about it. I think Wish is a TERRIBLY disappointing album. It's not bad, but it's a damn sight worse than its predecessor, Disintegration. In 1991, The Cure were at a crossroads. Disintegration brought them the biggest audience they ever had. The had just been named Best Alternative band (I wanna say that was the Brit Awards) and they had to make an extremely important career decision. They made a HUGE collection of songs for their next LP, the biggest since The Kiss Me album.
Thanks to Boris F*cking Williams they chose to cash in. They made a compromise album similar to Kiss Me, a collection of dark and commercially oriented songs that ultimately makes for mediocre listening and waters down The Cure's true power as a band. They made sure EVERYONE heard Friday I'm in Love and no one heard The Big Hand.
But it didn't stop there. This financially conscious method of making music persisted for almost a decade, coming out with the butterfaced Wild Mood Swings album, The Phantom Menace of Cure records. When the Mid Life Crisis Masterpiece of Bloodflowers came out it was too little too late. Not truly dark anymore, just pathetic and sad.
So Wish could have been the last great Cure album. Robert Smith, Like Ronnie James Dio "lost his hold on the magic flame" by selling out his great band in 1992. It didn't have to be that way, but it was and The Cure never recovered.
It all started when they buried The Big Hand.
The silver lining is that you can still hear what the dark album would've sounded like. You can "fix" Wish by piecing the dark songs from the period back together.
Foolish arrangement 2. A Letter to Elise 3. This Twilight Garden 4. The Big Hand 5. Cut 6. From the edge of the deep green sea 7. Apart 8. Play 9.End
Now that's a powerful album. That's the album they should have released.
This is the problem people have with their idea of “The Cure” - they want The Cure to be this dark, gloomy band when in reality they just aren’t most of the time. Aside from Faith and Pornography, their entire output from the 80’s was littered with pop songs. If anything, Disintegration was the biggest departure from The Cure’s sound along with the move from Pornography to the stuff released on Japanese Whispers and The Top. This is what makes The Cure such a great band. Every album has a distinct sound. Robert never sold the band out. They...
This is the problem people have with their idea of “The Cure” - they want The Cure to be this dark, gloomy band when in reality they just aren’t most of the time. Aside from Faith and Pornography, their entire output from the 80’s was littered with pop songs. If anything, Disintegration was the biggest departure from The Cure’s sound along with the move from Pornography to the stuff released on Japanese Whispers and The Top. This is what makes The Cure such a great band. Every album has a distinct sound. Robert never sold the band out. They just got older. Hell, even Disintegration had it’s poppy moments albeit fewer than MOST Cure albums.
I will say I do agree with it being a mistake having a song like The Big Hand not put on the album. Same as Scared as You and Play. The only song I think from that era they should have scrapped was Wendy Time, and that’s not even really a bad song. It’s just not as good as any other song they put out at the time.
I see what happened with The Cure is hat the times changed and they changed with them while still trying to be The Cure and to me they succeeded.
I can see how The Big Hand can signify heroin, such as in Black Sabbath's Hand of Doom or Sabbath Bloody Sabbath "you're wishing that the hand of doom can take your mind away". However, in the VHS Play Out version of the song he says something like "and the big hand sees the things that you've done". So I am leaning towards the whole hand of God concept rather than drugs.
I am very intrigued about what a previous commentor said about the Hand motifs in Wish's album art and how The Big Hand was kept off the album. I think this is very telling and I will add more on the subject, even my own far-fetched conspiracy theory! So the Wikipedia article for A Letter to Elise makes reference to a radio interview with Boris Williams and how he used his influence to keep The Big Hand from being released a single A-side. I think he also may have used his influence to make Wish the commercial album it ultimately became in 1992.
Backtrack to 1991. The Cure released 2 VHS cassettes that year. Picture Show featured an instrumental version of The Big Hand during the rolling of the credits and Play Out showed The Big Hand as the first song performed on the Video. Coupled with the fact that they had plans for the song to be a single A-Side and the hand drawings on the album cover, this has got to be the most important B-Side they ever had. In fact it seems intentionally buried, shunted off to an obscure European single, far from American audiences while Friday I'm in Love nanced it's way across MTV and every radio station ad nauseum.
I will make no secret about it. I think Wish is a TERRIBLY disappointing album. It's not bad, but it's a damn sight worse than its predecessor, Disintegration. In 1991, The Cure were at a crossroads. Disintegration brought them the biggest audience they ever had. The had just been named Best Alternative band (I wanna say that was the Brit Awards) and they had to make an extremely important career decision. They made a HUGE collection of songs for their next LP, the biggest since The Kiss Me album.
Thanks to Boris F*cking Williams they chose to cash in. They made a compromise album similar to Kiss Me, a collection of dark and commercially oriented songs that ultimately makes for mediocre listening and waters down The Cure's true power as a band. They made sure EVERYONE heard Friday I'm in Love and no one heard The Big Hand.
But it didn't stop there. This financially conscious method of making music persisted for almost a decade, coming out with the butterfaced Wild Mood Swings album, The Phantom Menace of Cure records. When the Mid Life Crisis Masterpiece of Bloodflowers came out it was too little too late. Not truly dark anymore, just pathetic and sad.
So Wish could have been the last great Cure album. Robert Smith, Like Ronnie James Dio "lost his hold on the magic flame" by selling out his great band in 1992. It didn't have to be that way, but it was and The Cure never recovered.
It all started when they buried The Big Hand.
The silver lining is that you can still hear what the dark album would've sounded like. You can "fix" Wish by piecing the dark songs from the period back together.
Now that's a powerful album. That's the album they should have released.
@Sellersburg
@Sellersburg
This is the problem people have with their idea of “The Cure” - they want The Cure to be this dark, gloomy band when in reality they just aren’t most of the time. Aside from Faith and Pornography, their entire output from the 80’s was littered with pop songs. If anything, Disintegration was the biggest departure from The Cure’s sound along with the move from Pornography to the stuff released on Japanese Whispers and The Top. This is what makes The Cure such a great band. Every album has a distinct sound. Robert never sold the band out. They...
This is the problem people have with their idea of “The Cure” - they want The Cure to be this dark, gloomy band when in reality they just aren’t most of the time. Aside from Faith and Pornography, their entire output from the 80’s was littered with pop songs. If anything, Disintegration was the biggest departure from The Cure’s sound along with the move from Pornography to the stuff released on Japanese Whispers and The Top. This is what makes The Cure such a great band. Every album has a distinct sound. Robert never sold the band out. They just got older. Hell, even Disintegration had it’s poppy moments albeit fewer than MOST Cure albums.
I will say I do agree with it being a mistake having a song like The Big Hand not put on the album. Same as Scared as You and Play. The only song I think from that era they should have scrapped was Wendy Time, and that’s not even really a bad song. It’s just not as good as any other song they put out at the time.
I see what happened with The Cure is hat the times changed and they changed with them while still trying to be The Cure and to me they succeeded.